


Reflected in Reverse

by Green_Destiny



Category: Finder no Hyouteki | Finder Series
Genre: Forest Bathing, Geographical Isolation, M/M, Mystery, Photography, Rehabilitation, Romance, Suspense
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-29
Updated: 2016-01-29
Packaged: 2018-05-17 00:56:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5847640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Green_Destiny/pseuds/Green_Destiny
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The lens captures darkness beyond what the eyes may see.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reflected in Reverse

**Author's Note:**

> I thought of this story around Halloween time, when I was feeling festively spooky, but I didn't actually contemplate writing it until December. It's a little intermission I'm giving myself after spending over two years writing Divining Infinity. Gotta try a different flavour once in a while :)
> 
> Thank you so much Eprime for the beta ♥

 

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[This is not an Escape.]

 

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Who can say they can breathe in Tokyo when there's this little heavenly spot of brilliant green and gold on a mountainside, somewhere between home and the edge of the world. Autumn is in full, symphonic motion, and the ground is a chromatic shed of leaves. Small piles line along the steep roads and immense forests, gold-green mottled with maple trees that are red all year round, shaking their gnarly, hundred-year-old limbs skyward.

For weeks, Akihito felt as though the misery would never end. It’d been power naps and stakeouts, dried packet food and carton juice, scraping the pavements of Tokyo in wet clothes and a runny nose and arguing with his employer for sending him on all these stupid, banal assignments with neither head nor tail of anything concrete to build a story on. It’s as though the chain smoking coffee guzzlers at Tokyo Sunrise Shimbun feed him leads that come through a toaster, and laugh at his back as soon as he’s out of the door to stew through another baseless stakeout, hopeless and jaded. It’s starting to send him crazy.

He’s noticed the bitterness exaggerate every action and reaction in himself, in uncharacteristic shades of aggression. On any given day Akihito would bark at someone for driving too slowly, swear with his finger so they’ll see him thoroughly pissed off through their rear-view mirror. He’ll ignore a person asking for directions and forget to say thank you to the clerk at the seven eleven when he’s buying his hydrogenated foodstuffs for the next soul destroying assignment. And he’ll catch a street thug tampering with the lock on his scooter and his adrenaline will spike. He’ll be ferociously disinterested in anything other than this jerk’s battered, tear-streaked, ugly face pleading with him, and that’ll be the shape of his day, as graceful as his bloody, fractured hand and his last, best camera on the wet stone pavement, in pieces.

But Akihito’s misery was going to see a transformation. He wasn't searching for it, but it found him anyway — that perfect, olden-day camera like the one his father used to own back in the eighties, a vintage 35mm in the window of a second-hand shop near the busy rail network in Shinjuku. Nostalgia at this paltry price tag was almost too irresistible to pass by, and now it’s taking its very first journey with him.

Asami navigates his Mercedes M Class through the winding, leaf strewn road deeper into the woods to a private guesthouse — theirs for a long weekend. It has its own hot spring, so they've been told. With Akihito’s plaster cast cut away the week before last, he can't wait to soak himself in it, like loose leaf tea, diffusing.

The dense mat of leaves scrapes along the sides of their car and the road becomes a little more uneven, a little more wild as the forest and all its expanse closes around them. “Are you sure this is the way?” Akihito asks.

“Yes,” Asami replies. As reassuring as one word could be.

Akihito tips his head back and looks up through the sunroof to see only the occasional flares of sunlight penetrating the canopy. Asami said it was secluded, but perhaps he neglected the sense of claustrophobia to go along with it.

“Can you see that?” Asami then says, pointing to the wooden house starting to reveal itself in the distance. “That’s where it is.”

“Oh yeah,” Akihito nods, “I can see it.”

The narrow road segues into a wider clearing and the whole guesthouse comes into full view, beautiful and old and as quaint as its natural surroundings. Asami parks outside on the gravel and Akihito steps out, fresh air making its way into his lungs to clean out a journey’s worth of second hand smoke. His boots crunch into the gravel and the first words out of his mouth are, “Damn, it’s pretty big for a small house.”

Which it is. A single level wooden guest house on an acre of its own land, with traditional tended gardens and a shelter of overhanging willows and beautifully arranged rock ornaments, all fenced in and gated, like its own little paradise.

“It gets better,” Asami says, and hauls their overnight bags from the boot of the car, with Akihito carrying their food supplies in a plastic tote. A black path leads them through the gated entrance, shale delicately crunching under their feet, diverting Akihito’s attentions from the ambient but bare sound of the forest, eerily absent of wildlife. Asami slides open the wood panel door, old mahogany creaking and quivering as though it hasn’t been opened in years, and Akihito finally gets why the exclusivity of this luxurious hideaway appeals to Asami’s predilection for exceedingly nice things.

“You weren’t kidding,” Akihito says, open mouthed as he steps through the doorway onto the mirror-polished wood floor, lacquered in a way that maximises the very great detail that's gone into preparing every square inch of space. He’s experienced ryokans on the cheap end that are cosily rustic, and provides everything he needs from a temporary stay, delicious food included. This, however, ranks pretty high on his list of spectacular first experiences. The entrance hallway alone probably took a hundred craftsmen to carve the intricate patterns into every wooden panel and cornice. White orchids spill from ornate vases and canvas lanterns light the table where their yukatas and welcome gifts are.

“Now this is some welcome,” Akihito says. Incidentally, the welcome note addresses them both as ‘Asami’ and he scoffs at it.

Asami walks in behind him, changed into leather slippers and carries their bags down a hallway to presumably the bedroom. Akihito drops the food tote in the kitchen area and has a quick wander around, familiarising himself with his surroundings. He pokes his head around into rooms and slides open screen doors to let in more light. So far he's seen a lot of empty rooms but eventually he comes across the dining room, furnished beautifully and a large mural of a traditional Japanese scene painted onto its back wall, depicting a balmy sun-stroked evening over a meadow of sakura on one panel, and snowcapped hills on the other panel, two contrasting seasons set side by side. It’s a beautiful effect.

He pulls the shoji west of the room and follows the long, windowless corridor to the very end where there’s only a single wooden door and a chain of incantation-laden tassels and metallic charms hanging from it. They clatter as he slides the door slightly ajar and peeks into a furnitureless black and red room. The solid black walls reflect back like a mirror, a feature appearing in so many of the rooms of the house. Red tatami panels lay in an odd arrangement on the floor, placed haphazardly with no aligned continuity, and a particular eyesore being the single panel of white tatami breaking the theme apart. It’s strange, Akihito feels. Strange that he’s merely standing here and a sense of rocking seasickness sets into him. He’s standing motionless in the same spot and yet hears the groans of the floorboards creak without any contribution from himself, and the disorientation of looking at the walls reflecting back at him again and again, in an infinity of reflections. Maybe he's overestimating his senses, perhaps there's a legitimate reason for the room to be like this that he'll accept when he's less nauseous, but a primal fear wades in his gut and he trusts it. He pulls away from the room and shuts the door, returning back the way he came.

Outside he discovers the hot spring bath that he’s been looking forward to seeing, set amongst towering bamboos and weeping willows and a moss covered rockery cascading a mini waterfall over the rocks, inspiring genuine peacefulness as he listens to it trickle its frail but delectable sound. If all else in this place stokes up wild curiosity, the familiar, cleansing sounds of the onsen wash his mind clear of them.

He finds Asami in the bedroom, where the decadence continues, and his heart beats just a little more rampantly when he sees Asami under the sheer embroidered canopy, with one foot up on the platform step of their bed and the other long limb anchored to the ground, delineating the shape of his calf muscle against his trousers that’s something of an unspoken erogenous area for Akihito. Asami’s sorting through their bags, taking their essentials and toiletries and having already set aside Akihito’s camera case on the side of the bed that he’ll eventually be sleeping on. Within this effortless gesture is the fine knowledge that no one else could understand him like Asami does, all the catalogue of details and sharing a like-for-like fascination with each other, Asami could probably speak his whole life in one breath and it’d make him so sensationally, so incredibly complete.

“I know I should be used to all of this by now, but…” Akihito starts, sounding wistful, “This place is something else, it feels surreal.”

Asami turns from what he's doing to look at him. “What's surreal about it?”

“I don't know,” Akihito shrugs. “It's a gorgeous house in the middle of nowhere, with all this crazy, carved out furniture. I mean, have you seen the other rooms? The onsen outside? It’s insane.”

“We’re not in the middle of nowhere, we’re in Yamagata,” Asami informs him. “This house is part of a private heritage company and it isn’t the only luxury resort in this prefecture, though, it’s exclusive only to a select few clients.”

“But it’s mad. I love it, actually. I feel as though I’m in another plane of existence, and I’m lost in it but it feels good to be lost. There were Shide tassels on the walls in every room and tied to the trees outside, and a mini waterfall in the onsen. There’s even a room with red tatami...” Akihito rambles on through a stream of consciousness, his usual habit for when he’s overwhelmed by something. He captures a description and etches it into his mind before he has the chance to capture it permanently on camera. He does it without realising, his way of documenting everything he senses, documenting life in an incongruous, charming litany. Asami leaves what he’s doing and goes over to him, stroking a hand across his cheek and the rambling drips into a warm sigh, and then into silence.

“You needed the escape,” Asami says to him, and ushers the boy into his arms.

A further awareness creeps into Akihito when the non-stop anger he’d been feeling for weeks takes barely a second to leave his system. They say nothing for a moment, but give each other two minutes to revel in the escapism, and for him, the simplicity of Asami’s touches — the feel of him running his lips through his hair, kissing him on his crown, taking a hold of his cheeks and touching his lips against the creases of Akihito’s own, tracing their shape and swallowing tender, open mouthed gasps.

How grateful Akihito is to be lost.

✣

Akihito lifts the collar of his jacket and breathes into his palms, shuddering a frosty breath. The air has cooled somewhat since they arrived and the wind speed is starting to pick up. Leaves curl up from the floor and spiral into the wind, whipping a chill that travels right up Akihito’s spine, but he clasps his cold hands around his camera and continues shooting. This dense, deciduous setting captures in his viewfinder like a dream. There are the odd pools of sunlight gorgeously lit from the cracks in the canopy and leak along the forest floor that Akihito wants all to himself.

The only other thing he loves to capture more than a gold-gilded forest is Asami in his designer cashmere coat that sails in the wind, one level shade of dark amongst gold — the very colours and emotions he associates with this man. He snaps a few pictures as Asami walks ahead of him, hands stuffed into his pockets and making an ordinary moment evoke pleasure in him in an indefinable way. His handsome head turns, and Akihito jogs to catch up with him — Asami often beckons him like that, with just a look, and always, Akihito finds himself inexorably drawn to him.

The leaves slowly fall around them and soon the path through the forest becomes indiscernible. Asami lights a cigarette, his second of their walk, and continues in the direction of his choosing, deciding the way for both of them. Akihito points his camera way up into the rustling canopy and doesn’t spot a bird or tree dweller in sight.

“Don’t you find it strange that there are no bird sounds?” he says.

“They usually migrate at this time of the year, don’t they?”

“They do but...not all of them, surely. It's unusual to hear nothing in all of this open space.”

“You’re creating another unnecessary worry for yourself,” Asami chuffs. Incidentally, the quieter than quiet background noise gives Asami a therapeutic satisfaction. He’s far away from the harmonics of high powered business and misanthropic tendencies and not inclined to worry about the natural whereabouts of the animal kingdom.

“Look, Asami. There's something over there,” Akihito says, pointing ahead at the large stone on the side of the path. It's the first non-tree landmark they've come across, and as they draw closer, the carved detail of the stone distinguishes two sagely figures locked in a prayer.

“It's a shrine for travellers,” Asami reveals. One that's particularly old and ruined by the weather. Tokyo has shrines like these on its outskirts that attract the superstitious as much as ordinary folk for guiding them safely on their journey beyond the capital. Asami makes a small gesture of respect and carries on walking.

Further along, several more stones jut out of the ground, darkened and moss covered, some beaten right down by the elements. They pass another three before their frequency starts to bother Akihito. “There are _a lot_ of shrines here,” he says, and in part, quite warily. He thought for all of a half hour’s walk that the forest belonged to them. Maybe these shrines share a collective meaning.

Asami stops and casts a glance at Akihito scrutinising the rock. He takes a last drag from his cigarette and crushes it under the toe of his shoe, and inside a long, serious silence, Akihito stares back at him and says, “Maybe we should make an offering.”

“What do you propose we offer to a stone, Akihito?”

“You always have to be a cynic.”

Akihito digs into his pockets for a coin and places it on top of the shrine, and asks that the ancestors keep them safe, but Asami most of all, from an angry congregation of all the spirits he's offended, and will offend from here on in, probably. A subtle wind draws past and Akihito takes it as a favourable bestowing. He'll have his man for a little while longer, it seems. He chuckles at the thought and looks at the said man, catching him in an unguarded moment rubbing the dust from his eye, striking a balance between looking so lethal and so vulnerable, it’s all so arrestingly beautiful to Akihito. He lifts his camera to take a snap, but then decides not to take a picture. Moments like this are so rare that even a camera feels like an uninvited guest into their private and very personal intimacy. He taps Asami gently on the shoulder to assess his watery eye but Asami waves him off, and Akihito laughs for a second time. Maybe the ancestors aren’t so forgiving after all.

✣

They return back to the house and Asami goes straight inside while Akihito walks around the side of the house and through the gardens to relocate the onsen. Each section of the garden is cordoned off with shrubs and high-climbers and tall fences which can’t be overlooked. Secret and silent, perfect for a sweet, outdoorsy fuck, or perfect for a murder, and that's why this place is so amazing and unbearable at the same time.

But he can be content with it, because onsens, no matter where they are, are _wonderful_ things. He almost never bathes in outside onsens during the colder months, and onsens during the summer are packed to capacity with old people and screaming kids. Yet, he can easily embrace the silence for this instantaneous bit of pleasure. He's beside himself already, curving his back around the heated rocks and filling his lungs with the smell of natural minerals. He wishes so badly that he came here when he was recovering from his broken hand so he could experience the warm healing effect of these waters quite literally fusing his bones back together. An operation and six pins was the extent of the repair. There’s still an ache there when he twists his hand in a certain way, or when he stretches a single digit and curls the rest, or when Asami’s less than gentle grip binds it to the bed, and then the possibility of complaining of pain becomes a moot point. (And something he can't quite bring himself to make a fuss about.)

Asami did so much for him while doing relatively little on his part just to get him through the day. The first night Akihito was discharged from the hospital Asami didn't let him out of his sight, and the days following were extended with agony trying to cook a meal or dress himself or even admit that he needed help with basic tasks. Asami willingly embraced the strain with him, diminishing his pain, and in turn, healing him. Because Akihito could never say, in his most pain-driven, vitriolic episodes, that he wanted Asami to do _anything_ so automatically for him, drop his schedules and come to his aid. He wasn’t a damsel that needed saving all the time. And yet Asami did it all anyway, anything and everything to make the space between them breathable again.

And just now, his quiet contemplation takes a plunge. He opens his eyes to see Asami wading his way towards him through the heated fog, submerged from the knees down, his body too molten to stare at for too long and too incredible to look away from, it makes every anticipation Akihito has for this man lusciously real. There’s nothing respectable about an addiction like this, but Akihito conceded long ago that the universe didn’t create an Asami to have him be ignored. As soon as Asami comes within an arm's distance, he's pulled into an embrace and kissed up against the rocks, and Akihito’s legs and arms come around to wrap around him tightly, Asami only has to kneel and it makes Akihito’s mouth water feeling his strong thighs and hard crotch pressing into his ass, and reminds him of all the times he’s ridden this man’s incredible arousal into oblivion and feasted on that incomparable high.

Except maybe _this_ , this being the subtlety that has been defining his life ever since he entered into this relationship with one of the most powerful men in the world. The impression of one Asami Ryuichi — wealthy, elite, untouchable, master of the universe and master of all of Akihito’s dreams — makes subtle waves with his emotions, all that discipline and structure, where Akihito’s emotions are unashamedly raucous, Asami can read thoughts and emotions as though they're telegraphing across Akihito’s forehead, and acts in this gorgeous, succinct way in answer. They’re just kissing but it's as if Asami knows the contents of his soul as he does it, the intensity of just one kiss taking Akihito’s breath away, constantly. He lifts his eyes to look at his lover, his mind swirling and heady and he touches his fingers along Asami’s handsome jaw, wondering if this anticipation will break him, if he’s going to commit the thousand-year-old taboo concerning having sex in an onsen because this man is too hot for him to bear. Really, Akihito's only quandary of this whole afternoon has been whether he should bathe or eat first and now he has the dilemma of this to contend with.

“Maybe we should go to bed,” he says, and Asami tears him with the sinful curve of his lips, saying, “I'll take care of you right here,” essentially shattering the taboo and Akihito’s mind along with it. It’s exactly how he imaged, and exactly how Asami would break him, with a little preparation and a luscious growl, he's encroaching him like the fog diffusing into his brain and a flash fire on his tongue. He can’t think or breathe or do little else but fold up into Asami's arms and want to be taken against this rock and an even harder chest, and have Asami’s abs tensing and driving the full girth of his arousal gloriously into him.

But it never reaches that point. Instead a sudden, inexplicable deluge of cold bolts through every nerve of Akihito’s body, embedding itself bone deep, making him frolic and gasp with deep, scraping inhales as though his tongue is going to slip down the back of his throat and choke him. He thrashes against Asami’s chest and doesn't realise he's beating the hell out of him until Asami wraps his arms around his flailing body and holds him together, uttering with surprise, “What's the matter? Oi, what’s this all of a sudden?”

It cuts through the barrage of cold and Akihito cradles his head, clinging to Asami and dry heaving. It was no ordinary chill he felt, invading him so privately at his most intimate time with Asami. Whatever it was had access to all of his vulnerabilities and extremities, and Akihito’s left visibly shaken by it. Raped by it.

“What happened to you, Akihito? Look at me.” Asami tips his head to make determinations from Akihito’s fear stricken expression, and the panic is set in his pupils, blown black almost to the edge of his irises.

Akihito swallows thickly and rasps. “I—I don’t know, I was so cold...I...Asami...”

Asami touches his palm against Akihito’s forehead and he feels no hotter or colder than the temperature of the water, the steam is still rising from his body. The cold must have been a phantom response, or the effects of anxiety. He’s never seen a reaction from Akihito quite like this before, but he cards his fingers through Akihito's wet hair and places a kiss to his crown, allowing him to regain himself for as long as he needs.

✣

The incident runs its course by about twenty-five minutes past five, when dinner is prepared and served. They dine on the ornate black lacquered dining table amongst Asami’s plentiful menu of pickled and sauced vegetables, cured sashimi, salmon rolls and temaki, and a stove in the middle of the table simmering a flavourful broth which the most expensive beef in all of Japan is dipped in. There’s enough food here to feed all the upper crusts of society.

Akihito's face is warmed by the sweet alcoholic effect of the sake. The more he sips, the more conversational he gets and the more his internal monologue slips through his mouth.

“I really believe it now when they say that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.” Akihito smiles and picks up a sliced vegetable to dip it in the broth but it inelegantly falls off his chopsticks before it gets there. Asami picks it up for him and their chopstick exchange accompanied with the rattles of Akihito’s laughter spills through the quiet, initial silence.

“Are you confusing your love of food for genuine _love_ , Akihito? I’m interested to know.”

“What if I legitimately have a love for food? In this country, if a man can marry his pillowcase, then I can marry sushi or any other food I desire.”

Asami scoffs and says, outright, “I won't even dignify that with a response.”

Akihito looks impish. “Are you jealous of our polyamorous relationship?” he snorts.

Asami pauses just before a bite and his lingering, red hot glance at Akihito has all of the intensity and catastrophe of fire being set to his soul, bellying an emotional flux, just from a single, inspired look. “Food can’t satisfy you in all the ways that I can now, can it?” he says, obscenely seductive, then pops the morsel into his mouth and continues eating, and the moment of magnanimous pleasure dissolves, leaving Akihito ignited raw with want.

“It’s when you say things like, ‘What do you want to eat?’ or ‘Is there anything I can cook for you, Akihito?’ that makes it difficult not to be in love with food and…not...be in love.” He says it slowly, in an unraveling sort of admittance to himself.

Asami looks at him again, the same ravishing stare, and pushes the last slice of Kobe beef closer to him, saying, “Then, perhaps there’s no greater paragon of love than what you’ve just said.” It's caressing and without the usual thorn of sarcasm. Akihito takes the slice, it feels like the confession they never really had and it’s impossibly adorable.

After dinner, Asami smokes on the veranda, and Akihito sips a cold Asahi from the bottle as they both witness the last rays of the dying sun dipping below the trees. The days are getting shorter and the air’s gradually growing colder with mid-autumn's push for winter slowly heading its way. Akihito’s hanten falls from his shoulders and he slips it back up again. It’s Asami’s hanten, actually. When he has access to it he likes to wear it. It’s probably one of the most impressive pieces of traditional clothing Asami owns, dark blue in colour and handsomely flourished with a Hiroshige design of an eagle swooping in solid gold thread.

Yet, the colour of Akihito’s mood has been off so they talk about it.

“How are you feeling?” Asami is first to asks, dabbed with subtle implication of earlier.

“...I’m alright,” Akihito replies with a small hesitation. “It’s just...I think it was a combination of things getting the better of me. Work and my injury. Ruining my favourite camera...”

“Cameras can be replaced. And a freelancer needn’t stay where their employment makes them compromise their health.”

Akihito groans. “Yeah I know...but it’s like I'm some sort of joke to them. A young, no-named photojournalist tripping over their _prestigious_ coattails. I come into work every day and they send me round in circles, and then when I _do_ manage to catch a story, they reject it. Or someone gets in there before me. I can’t win. They have an impossible criteria that you need to be a mind reader to figure out.”

Asami scoffs at that. “You know as well as I do that the Tokyo Sunrise Shimbun scrape the bottom of every barrel to Midas garbage into gold. You give them too much credit.”

“Maybe I do. Maybe I just want to be taken seriously, for one goddamn second of my working life.”

“As seriously as they take your friend Mitarai,” Asami goads.

“Oh _please_ don't lump me in the same category as _Mitarai_ , “ Akihito lambasts. “His idea of a scoop is getting upskirt shots of models. He’s disgusting. And he’s not my friend. At all.”

“Tarnished by association then.”

“That’s hardly fair. I have no control over the morons I have to work with.”

“You shouldn't tolerate it. I wouldn't, not for a second.”

“And that's the difference between you and me. You can afford not to tolerate it. You're right at the top of the pecking order and I'm still trying to catch a break. I don't have the authority to challenge _anyone_ even if I wanted to, but god, Asami, do I want to, do I really, _really_ want to.”

“If you feel that strongly about it then why don't you?”

“ _Because,_ ” Akihito tries to reason with a bumbling effort, “...Because they’re vultures okay? They pick and pick at you until there's just bone, and by then any professional integrity you have left will be gone. They'll ruin my career even before it gets off the ground.”

“It wouldn't stop a rival paper from picking you up.”

“Yeah, they’d love that. I'd have to keep checking over my shoulder for someone who does more than tamper with my scooter.” Disgruntled, Akihito takes another gulp of beer and swallows it down with the bitter taste of this conversation. “Tough shit, huh.”

“I can easily get rid of them for you, if you want.”

Asami says it so evenly that Akihito doesn't know whether to worry or take it as an affectionate euphemism for the lengths Asami would go for him. Asami’s neither deranged nor romantic in the conventional way one might be, but he’s honest and extremely reliable, and Akihito laughs at that with little mirth.

“Don’t even bother. I want to be able to look them in the eye when I grab a scoop Japan won't be able to stop talking about for _years_. Hell, I want the whole world to know the shady shit that goes on in this country that gets swept under the carpet. They're so obsessed with their super clean image but there’s corruption in every corner. And somehow, _I'm_ the bad one. I’m the one that needs taking down.”

“The rot has always been in the system, Akihito. You just happen to work on the brighter side of corruption, but it’s corruption none the less.”

“And I hate it. I hate having to scrape through the mud and dirt while they get to stay clean. There’s so many dirty people out there I'd risk all to expose, but they're walking free because the authorities are paid to look the other way. They may have all the power, but I have power too.”

Asami takes another drag and blows out a steady stream of smoke, considering all of what Akihito's just said and stays silence for the most part. He’s not about to impart his own thoughts on the benefits of having power. Akihito’s only ever a shutter click away from bringing a man down, or raising him from the dead. “Tell me the setup to Otsuka Miyabi’s fall from grace again.”

Immediately, Akihito knows why Asami’s digging that up. The case of ‘squeaky clean’ Otsuka Miyabi was Akihito’s last big scoop about four months ago. He’d been compiling evidence on a drug trafficking ring for weeks, all on his own. Then, when the time came for the grand exposé, Akihito happened on a prominent TV star in and amongst the offenders, snorting a line through a thousand yen note. The irony was tragic.

“Look, that was a shock _no-one_ was expecting, okay. Least of all, me. I mean, I had my eye on these hard-headed gangsters for months, I was going out of my mind with fear that one of them would discover me. While I waited for the perfect, sweetest opportunity to finally nail those fuckers, she was thrown into the picture like a double whammy. Suddenly the whole story became about her and not, y’know, the real perpetrators. You should’ve seen how they messed with my article, it read like a fucking gossip rag. Her career went down the drain the very next day. I was her cruise missile to doom.”

“It's a little late to be picking apart the morality of what you're doing.”

“I _know_ that, but—it’s no longer about right or wrong anymore. Everyone has their own agenda that they keep wanting to push, controlling what we should and shouldn't be outraged about and what we should just happily accept. I'm outraged that our paper took up more column space for trivialities about ‘How low a woman can wear their shirt to work without it being unacceptable’ than the successful transplant of an artificially grown heart.”

Asami laughs and takes a generous drag of his cigarette. “My morning broadsheet is rather absent of scintillations of any pleasure. Breasts on the other hand...”

“Urgh,” Akihito groans. Asami’s sarcasm is not uplifting. “You know, you’re exactly why I lose faith in my job, and humanity in general.”

“You let things get to you too much.”

“No. I don't.” Akihito rebukes. “I don’t even know why I’m talking to you about this anyway, half of your business is illegal. You’re part of the problem.”

“You’ve been living under my roof for well over two years now and I’m still waiting for you to find that concrete bit of proof that'll put me away forever.”

“So sure I won't do it, huh?”

“If it's your one desire, Akihito, then I want nobody but you to do it.”

Akihito simmers and grumbles under his breath. He’d never, not after all that’s happened between them. He's too entrenched in Asami’s world to find legal cracks in his business etiquette. As much as he threatened the scoop that would bring Asami down early on in their turbulent meetings, it’d be the only thing irreparable to his soul if he did it now. He loves and respects him far too deeply to ever sell him out. Corruption? Yeah, this might be it.

“I know the way you work, Akihito. I've seen it first hand. You want the facts. The unknown truth. I know.”

“Yeah, exactly,” Akihito affirms. “I want the absolute of what I’m covering to be the truth, what the public’s interest needs access to, and I want it to be mine, not hijacked by someone else's agenda. I’ll fight it, because fuck them. The madness will all be worth it, one day,” he concludes.

Asami taps the end of his cigarette on the wooden edge of the veranda rail and inhales a cold breath of air that he can taste around the tobacco, and he hears the comprehension in Akihito’s crystal clear voice, the icy husk of ambition and guts all painted and fleshed out like the Mona Lisa’s cyanide smile, so utterly ill-equipped to do anything about the system but never giving into it. The sense he gets from the boy’s rough benevolence is a startlingly beautiful thing.

“Come on, let's go inside. I want to fully indulge in your ‘fight to the death’ spirit while it’s still running a temper through you.”

**Author's Note:**

> The title of this chapter, '森林浴　Shinrinyoku,' means 'Forest Bathing' - To go deep into the woods where everything is silent and peaceful for a relaxation.


End file.
